March 26/10 13:51 pm - HCC's Good Friday RR Shaping Up

Posted by Editoress on 03/26/10

Good Friday Road Race Brings Talent, History and Youth Development to Flamborough

Hello Friends and Fans of Cycling!

Right now, bike racers across Ontario are registering for the very first race of the 2010 Ontario Cup series -- and the Hamilton Cycling Club is thrilled to be its host once again. The home-grown classic known as the Good Friday Road Race will take to the drumlins of Flamborough on Friday, April 2. Somehow, we've kept this party on two wheels going for 58 years.

The Good Friday Road Race is a race that attracts some of the highest-calibre amateur road cyclists to the Hamilton area each spring. The course is a 18.5km loop with 150 metres of climbing covering roads such as Brock, 5th Concession, Middletown Road, 6th Concession, Westover Road and Safari Road. The course includes five drumlins of up to 40 metres high. It follows the rules of the Ontario Cycling Association.

Some background on the race and the host club

• Host club, the Hamilton Cycling Club, is seeing mountain bike racers joining in droves and coming to the race as it expands its own MTB offerings and advocacy. One of these is Marc Risdale, who says: "I'll be racing M3 and this will be my first road race ever. I've done a lot of mountain bike and cyclocross racing but this will be totally new territory for me. My plan is to ride with the pack (assuming I can keep up, I'm a mid-pack M2 in cyclo-cross and mid-pack Expert in MTB) and see where I fit in. I have no other aspirations. I'm really looking forward to it (and driving the chase car in the later races)!"

• The race is in its 58th year, and has gone through sooo many changes it is hard to keep up. We have had big purses, small purses, routes in and out of Hamilton, and the race has even been named after our former lead sponsor, the Hamilton Spectator. Former winners and racers include Olympians, such as Brian Chewter, Adrian Prosser, Sue Palmer-Komar and many more.

• We are expecting an appearance by a friend of HCC by the name of Roger Tupper, who is bringing his 19th century Penny Farthings (big-front-wheeled antique bikes) to the race itself! He has a set of recently-repaired bikes that include seven from the 1800s, including an 1860s boneshaker. He also owns some 19th-century Hamilton cycling memorabilia. He belongs to the Wheelmen (wheelmen.org)

• The HCC has dramatically increased the support it is giving to young riders, after discovering that unless we support riders in their teens, they will go elsewhere or, worse, leave the sport before reaching their full potential. We are sponsoring several youth riders this year, and offering free spinning classes and race entries to all of our youth riders at HCC.